Sitting with a StammLady Sara Arzan

Introduce yourself. Describe your relationship with EHL and the network.

My name is Sara Arzan; I graduated from EHL last July during the covid pandemic and continued my passion for entrepreneurship through my studies in a master's school in London. With the increase of Romanians within EHL, EHL and I thought that the creation of Stamm Romania was essential. In terms of the network, when I first did my internship in Geneva, the general manager was an EHL alumnus automatically gave me an automatic connection.

What are some key factors and motivations for becoming a Stammlady?

Firstly the motivation is derived from hearing about the different Stamms around the world. It was sad that we didn't have one in Romania out of all the Stamms existing in the world. Firstly, a Stamm can be easily said to be a place to network and create friends. Especially now that EHL has a new Alumni platform called Connect, it is easier for people to track and trace opportunities and network. It is an excellent opportunity to meet everyone in the country who is an EHL alumnus or student. Help everyone else get in contact with other AEHL alumni in the country. It is nice to see each member already catching up within the committee. If someone is looking for a job or an open position, the Stamm committee would be instrumental and beneficial.

With the first Stamm Romania event on the books, what are the future plans in terms of events and for the AEHL Community in Romania?

Our first event happened in April, and it was an online event; and I was happy to see many people sign up and show up. As of now, we are still sticking to online events. As I mentioned earlier, many EHL Romanian alumni and students are not currently in the country, so people can still join and show up with convenience. The biggest issue is to think of a way to bring everyone together, face-to-face, not just online.

The committees consist of people of different age groups. We hope to bring people from other age groups to establish a new perspective and image of the Stamm itself- having people very experienced and people who are just stepping into the industry. The Stamm itself is very young. Therefore, we are taking small steps into developing the Stamm, potentially hosting events, and making the Stamm active.

Where do you see yourself in five years? What about the Stamm in Romania?

I think that is a challenging question to answer with Covid, but as of now, everything is going to change superbly quickly. Since I have achieved my master's in entrepreneurship, I am very interested in events and sustainability; therefore, I want to open my own company on events in the future. Currently, I am working for a hospitality tech company; I have been working with them since my second internship.

In terms of the Stamm, I hope that we will be over 100 people by then, people exchanging idea and knowledge, potentially working alongside each other and valuing each other like "family" The plan in the committee is to create activities where people can benefit from with new and fresh knowledge.